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Source: ONE News -
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A 16-year-old girl has been arrested after a fatal house fire
south of Auckland in the early hours of Tuesday morning.
The body of a 49-year-old woman was found in a top floor bedroom
after a massive blaze gutted the Pukekohe house.
Despite the neighbours' quick response, the house was engulfed
in flames when firefighters arrived.
The sole occupant was trapped inside.
"The heat was so intense on the other side when I came out it was billowing out of the windows in the top story. And I knew the children weren't there, I hadn't seen the children but I wasn't so sure about the mother," says Brian Golding, neighbour.
Another neighbour, Wana Wilson, says he got up and went outside.
"And the next door neighbours' house was on fire and it just went up in flames, that quick."
At one stage flames endangered neighbouring properties.
"We had to hose down the side of our house because it was so close
it could have caught on fire," says a woman neighbour.
The Fire Service had grave concerns for two other people believed to be in the house but they were later found at another address.
Firefighters and police treated the blaze as suspicious from early on and have been at the scene since daybreak investigating the exact cause of the fire.
They have since arrested the 16-year-old girl and she is expected to appear in the Pukekohe Youth Court on Tuesday charged with arson.
Police say she is likely to face further charges.
They say the girl is known to the family but not related.
The identity of the victim, a mother of three, has not yet been revealed.
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